Twelve Years Later: What Do I Miss?

In a few days it will be June 30, the anniversary of my “retirement” date from full-time active service from the University of South Carolina. Each year I use this as a marker to reflect on what life is like away from a daily existence on a University campus, what I have learned, what (and who) I miss, what I have gained.

Admittedly, my “retirement” was “early” and after thirty-two and a half years. And it has not led to retirement at all. I still have an appointment with duties at the University as “Senior Fellow” (translate: elder statesman). And I have a full-time appointment as a CEO of a non-profit higher education organization that does planning with colleges and universities.

I am glad I left at the top of my game and before I was at the point when people wanted me to go

I am glad I agreed to a retirement party extravaganza which we turned into a celebration of all that my work had stood for in the First-Year Experience. It was a wonderful ritual for closure.

I am glad I held a personal, one-on-one closed door conversation with every person who reported to me so I could share what they had meant to me

I am thankful that the leaders I worked for and with wanted me to have some continuing involvement and hence my appointment as Senior Fellow

I am proud of the job that has been done by my successors in making our first-year campus programs and our national and international work stronger than ever

I am grateful to my University for being more invested in our work than ever

I am thankful I spent my entire campus-based career in one place and never even flirted for a second about cheating on USC and forsaking her for another

I am thankful for all the outstanding leaders I worked for, all of whom I learned from and grew as a result of.

But my most recurrent thoughts are about what I miss the most:

I miss the students

I miss the faculty

I miss the staff

I miss the collegiality, the camaraderie, the partnerships

I miss the sanity, the good will, the servant leader ethos,the oasis of liberalism in a true wasteland of reactionary politics at the state level

I miss the gracious, generous, appreciative people of South Carolina who have always deserved better leaders than they have received

I miss the sense of contributing each day to an institution that has been here before me and will long outlive me

I miss the opportunity each day to contribute to the ongoing contribution of a great public university towards achieving social justice for all the citizens of the state

I miss more specifically about the students: their energy; their intellectual curiosity; their risk taking; their open mindedness; their courage; their great work ethic; their civility and politeness; their deference to their elders; their passion for serving fellow students; their youth; their liminal state between adolescence and adulthood; their radiant sexuality; their searching for meaning and desire to make a difference; their beauty; their wholesomeness; their ability to learn so rapidly and so well.

Truly, the students are what I miss the most. My wife would tell you if you, she and I were together, that I miss them so much that when I encounter them as servers in restaurants, I immediately interview them like a first meeting between academic advisor and student advisee.

I have heard it said that being a full professor at a research university is the best job in America. Who would ever want to leave it? I understand that question and some of the answers. What a great life.

What do you love about your life in higher education? What will you miss when you retire? How can you make the most of it before then? It’s all up to you.

The FoE process was transformational for MCCC. It helped us bring all stakeholders together and have a dialogue that has brought real changes to our institution. As we journey on, we are now very mindful and intentional in thinking about student success.— Dr. Steady Moono, Vice President for Student Affairs - Montgomery County Community College

The FoE self study helped us to identify initiatives that were working well, pin-point gaps in our services, and set goals for continuing to improve our efforts in meeting the needs of our students.— Amanda Yale, Associate Provost for Enrollment Services - Slippery Rock University

Our FoE Philosophy Statement served as the basis for the development of our Quality Enhancement Plan for SACS and for the improvements we have made to new student orientation, advising, and retention.— Debbi Clear, Vice President of Instruction & Student Services - Virginia Highlands Community College

The John N. Gardner Institute is a group of people that have an extremely high level of expertise in education. They know education - they don’t just know the software or a program - they know all the touch points needed to craft a good system that that is going to work for our students.— Stuart Benkert, Director of Complete College Tracking and Assessment, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga

We maximized our efforts by linking FoE with the Higher Learning Commission's AQIP system for accreditation. Through this link, efforts related to the first year had instant cross-functional commitment and were viewed through a continuous improvement lens.— Ali O'Brien, Asst. Vice President for Educational Affairs - College of Lake County

The John N. Gardner Institute has provided us an opportunity to really have candid conversations, as well as connect with other like-minded schools and senior staff. Student success is extremely important to our institution. With JNGI, you really get the idea of how we are all on the right path.— Sasha Heard, Student Affairs Manager, Allied American University

I am proud to say that our work is still going on almost four years later, and the focus on what is most important, the student, is still a large part of our planning for new programs and curriculum redesign.— Amy Baldwin, Instructor of English - Pulaski Technical College

Based on my experiences with the Institute, I can assert with assurance that FoE is a highly structured but very flexible process that has 'evolution' as its signature characteristic. An institution that participates in FoE exemplifies what Peter Senge calls "a learning institution."— Roberta Matthews, Former Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs - Brooklyn College

We've been in the implementation process for a short time and have achieved great momentum. In a time of 'lean' operating, FoE is the perfect tool to help institutions achieve efficient and effective operating goals while adding value to the student experience.— Shawn A. Anderson, Dean of Student Services - Minnesota State Community and Technical College

This has been an incredible (and quick) endeavor and an eye-opener in many ways. What is most rewarding to me, at the moment, is to have so much information in one place and accessible to so many people. This takes us way beyond anecdotal conversations. THANK YOU…for helping us get our data uploaded, assembled, reloaded, corrected, and available to our users.— Regina Shearer, Associate Vice President for Student Success, Rivier University

Working with the Gardner Institute provided a structure to look at institutional effectiveness. This structure was more encouraging, and less threatening, than evaluative agencies and brought people together from across the campus, all committed to the same task - new student success.— Mark Lange, Former FoE Liason - Holyoke Community College